Neptunus Lex and his commenters are on it. I added my two cents to the basic post titled Code of Conduct. Go over there and read the good words from a man who had the possibility, but never the “pleasure,” of being the guest of the military of a not so friendly to us nation to help frame some of the issues surrounding the incident of hostage taking by the Iranians that takes “above the fold” status in our media right now.

Here were my thoughts which I posted in his comments section:

Several issues come to mind with this incident:

While the “West” will realize that much of her statement most likely was coerced in one way or another, the “show” is not just to us. It was like Khadaffi launching 2 SA-5s in March ‘86 at our planes patrolling over the Gulf of Sidra: They were launched without benefit of the tracking radars being energized (which, by ROE, would have allowed the SEAD guys to ask no more questions before expending ordnance) so from a practical standpoint, they had no chance of striking a target (it being a semi-active homing weapon), unless a Naval Aviator decided to consciously fly into the ballistically projected path…No, it was about an Arab showing his great defiance of the Great Satan to his Arab brothers. They did have footage of the SA-5s rocketing off their launchers, so, he “saved face” and was a hero for a bit.

In that case, it certainly also gave leadership pause: Was it a hostile act if the weapon had an almost zero probability of hitting one of our units? Yes, we were scratching our heads for a while, but not long before the A-7s with HARM were granted permission to launch on any RADAR emissions (which they got to do). But, I digress…

The video of her speaking is to show the Arab world that Iran can take on the Western world, and despite the threats that got her to talk, which that culture most certainly knows all too well, that point will be dismissed and Iranian leadership has once more shown how weak the “West” is, as they can make us “talk” and we even have women to defend us. Big brownie points over there for the leadership.

Another thought come to mind about some letter or article in Proceedings I read many, many years ago, from a Naval Officer stationed in a mostly USAF joint command. He commented that everyone came to him to get naval questions answered and his admonition was to not think too much of your not so broad based naval experiences. He said he was (I believe, but old age my have caused the loss of detail) an aviator, so he said it was incumbent upon him to call old shipmates/classmates/other commands more clued in if he got questions about things like submarine capabilities. Good counsel, especially when you understand people make decisions based on what your respond with.

How does this play in? An Ordinary Seaman telling the world they most certainly had entered Iranian territorial waters? I don’t think she may have been privy to the exact positional data to make sure an assessment, particularly with the international relations implications. But, back to the first point: The rest of the world, except some of us, don’t realize that ordinary seaman, as good sailors as they may be, are not involved in the navigation operations of a vessel. All the world knows is it’s a “professional,” and therefore, the statement is valid….

I saw the scarf yesterday and it just made me think of dogs peeing on the fence post. Sorry about the base reference, but it’s about “marking” territory, which is really about stating who’s more powerful and she got to be the analogous fence post in this larger international affairs flap.

Anyhow, we live in interesting times…

The reference to the Gulf of Sidra operations in 1986 are provided in more detail in my serial posting A Journey into History, where I discuss the cruise that culminated in the bombing of Libya. I was there. The link is to Part I.

Update 3/31/2007: What did I tell you? It’s not about anything other than showing how great “they” are to their Islamic brothers (not mentioning sisters here, because those are just property to them).
Update 4/1/2007: Rich Lowry says the “move” has bigger implications than I imagined.

And a final new thought: Are the Brits being given Bibles and meals prepared especially for them, based on the diet they are used to in the UK, or are they being held without such luxuries? I’m sure no MSM reporter will consider finding out, for they may have to rethink their positions on GTMO.

Update 4/4/2007: Iran to release the Britons held in Iran. Nice move. And the President of Iran is “pardoning” them for their trespasses. Another poker chip on the table in the Middle East.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says 15 British naval personnel captured in the Gulf will be freed.
He repeated allegations that the British sailors and marines “invaded” Iranian waters, but said they would be freed as a “gift” to Britain.
[…]

Interesting turn of events. Leave your own territorial waters, enter those of another sovereign nation, take, by force military members of a third nation, lie about navigational data to the World, then “pardon” military members for a non-incursion into your sovereign nation’s territorial waters. Can someone explain why the rest of the world bows and scrapes and and thinks the Iranian Government is acting in some compassionate manner towards Her Majesty’s 15 sailors and marines?

In another time, the incursion of one nation’s military forces into the territory of another nation, with a specific, pre-planned operation to capture hostages (I’m not afraid of that word) from an allied, supporting nation’s military would have evoked a swift, and brutal military engagement. Yes, That’s right. One military attacked another. This isn’t diplomacy, it’s war, in accordance with the internationally recognized Laws of War. But that time seems to be past.

In another time, it was claimed that the use of force was the failure of diplomacy (I don’t agree with that view – military force is but one of the tools of diplomacy, used when it’s appropriate, not the diplomatic move of last resort), but as of recently reported news, it seems some would say the use of diplomacy is the failure of military force. That also is not true, but it will be preceived this way.

This buys Mahmoud Ahmadinejad points with his Islamic/Arab brothers (no sisters) for future propaganda to feed to the US/western world’s media outlets showing how he is a big enough man to solve a potential military face off by forgiving the trespassers (he might want to watch out, it’s beginning to sound pretty New Testament like to me). And, I predict, as the next election gets closer, we may even see the DNC use this as a model for how presidents should respond to aggression.

Remarkable! Cause the incident by design, let the tensions mount, then at the last moment, stand up and tell the world you’re the bigger man and forgetting it…

Score another win for the actors on the World’s stage. I’m not missing anything, am I?

Tracked back @: Thrid World County, stikNstein

SFC Thomas Nichols, US Army, also known as “Jack Army” on his blog, has provided a written response to TJ regarding the current situation in Iraq, which is posted at this link.

Teaser quote:

[…]
TJ: What gives you the greatest satisfaction with your current mission? What gives you the least?

SFC Nichols: The best part is seeing the Iraqis take charge of situations in the area. From IED discoveries to crowd control to providing security for pilgrims moving through the area, the Iraqi Army and Police are performing more and more of those tasks with less involvement from Coalition Forces. We are able to mentor and guide more than having to take charge and lead them by the nose. The least satisfaction comes on days when we can’t do what we planned, for example, our medic planned and coordinated for a three-day combat lifesaver course for the Iraqi Army troops. The IA medics would train the IA Soldiers under his supervision. He coordinated this training several weeks prior and even confirmed the training the day prior. At the appointed time, nobody showed for the training, not even the medics. When the IA battalion staff was asked what was going on, they simply forgot. Frustrating. Not the end of the world, I know, but a distinct challenge in maintaining motivation and mission focus. Is it merely a cultural difference? I’m not sure, but I am disappointed by it.
[…]

Go. Read. Be educated as to what boots on the ground are seeing right now.

H/T: Black Five

As I was chatting with a customer on site this morning, we hear a droning above and I look up to see 8 Dehaviland Twin Otters cleaning up a “V” formation, heading south, maybe around 12K ft…

So he tells me that are working this week to break the 200 way “sequential” freefall formation record (meaning making multiple, planned formations together on the same jump – all with 200 participants….). I think I might head back up this way Saturday, armed with sunscreen to see what happens.

Skydiving: When formations are that big, it is a great spectator sport….

Open trackback free fire zone…..

The “story” will appear a little bit later today…

Here “it” is:

It was a dark and stormy night (no, really!) and I had very recently been graced with the much toiled after “OOD(F)” (Officer of the Deck, Fleet Operations) letter, which was the “upgrade” from the prior check point in career development of the “OOD(I)” qualification. Now, I was placed in the watch rotation with the officers who were allowed to manage the moment to moment movements of the ship with other ships in formation. A big moment in a young surface warfare officer’s career. With the authority also came the responsibility of that duty as well.

We had been very busy unrepping (under way replenishing operations) most of the entire day light hours of that day out in the Atlantic, north of Puerto Rico somewhere. For a “fat ship,” that meant most of the crew was on deck, or at some attention mandating duty throughout the operations of passing “beans, bullets and black oil” to small (and big) boys alike. The Captain, at this time, Cecil Hawkins, spent most of his time in the port bridge wing chair and the XO, CDR David Martin, in the starboard bridge wing chair, watching the respective sides of the “main battery” of the ship, coordinating with the OOD for ship handling, the rig captains for hooking up, the other ship for stuff they needed, the supply officer to make sure the ships got the stuff they needed, etc, etc, etc. Even during a clear, sunny day, it’s a tough day, particularly mentally.

In the watch rotation, it was my turn to take OOD for normal steaming after we secured from UNREP stations, and late. The sky was almost black, for the cloud cover was solid and about 1000-1500 ft high. If the moon was full that night, it still mattered not, as we were stuck beneath the canopy of dense moisture. The CO and XO had departed the Bridge area and headed below to get some sleep, as time marched towards midnight.

We had been off to the side, with the designation as the formation guide (meaning everyone formed up on us, we just stayed on the ordered course and speed), so we had little maneuvering to worry about. Then the tactical radio crackled to life, giving us a coded message to take a station within the main formation of the aircraft carrier and the surrounding escorts. Guidance from the “standing orders:” Call and notify the Captain. Once I was certain the order was received and understood by my watch team, I picked up the sound powered phone and called the CO. He had had time to get to sleep, so this call (obviously) woke him up. He acknowledged my notification of our change in status in the formation.

We dutifully computed our course to get to the ordered station, and had plotted the formation stations of the other vessels. We would have to weave between a few ships to get inside the protective screen. Not bad, even at night, when equipped with such modern conveniences as RADAR, and the visibility, at surface level being pretty unrestricted. Get the bearing by visual observation, then check the range via RADAR and begin to move.

We were several miles out, so the move to station would take some time. Part way to the formation, the PRITAC (Primary Tactical, later TFTG TAC) spewed forth another message to the entire force in company: “Extinguish Navigation Lights.” OK…it was still a dark, but, the stormy part you could argue, and we had to now navigate by RADAR alone. Challenging, but not hair raising. Once more, call to inform the CO….Once more, in a sleepy voice, he responded that he understood we were now running in complete “darken ship” mode.

We steam on, a tired crew below, and the rest of us on watch. Again, the radio spoke: “EMCON ALPHA.” Emission control condition “A.” All electronics in the “off” position….on a dark, and maybe stormy night….still steaming in a 40,000 ton replenishment oiler towards an aircraft carrier, and her small boys in concentric rings about the capital ship.

Call the CO….

We got into station, no paint was scraped, no lives were lost, maybe some hair went gray (or grayer for the older watchstanders) and I was eventually relieved by the on coming ODD several hours later.

The next work day, one of the lieutenants came to me and gently whispered to me, while standing close to me and out of earshot of anyone else and said: “If the CO didn’t trust you to make good decisions, he wouldn’t have signed you OOD(F) letter.”

At one level good guidance, based on the long day the entire crew had had, but certainly OODs never really had free reign to do what they wished with the ship, even on some dark and stormy nights at sea.

Welcome, Lizards! If you aren’t too busy, and didn’t see it Friday, check out the Gathering of Eagles photo my friend took.

Well, first off…shouldn’t we be hollering “LOAD AND LOCK!”? Just a rhetorical question, but lookee what I found surfing about the net:

The picture is on the blog Calvey in Iraq, an Army National Guard Captain now “over there” who used to be an Oklahoma State Representative. Talk about someone who knows the political ropes!He left a comment on LCDR Smash’s (aka “Marches with Moonbats”) post about the anti-war demonstators in DC on 3/17/2007.I chased the link and found this worth a thousand words (of legislative printing) picture…

Tracked back @: Third World County, Dragon Lady’s World

Last post discussed the Explosives Handling Personal Qualification/Certification Program (EHPQCP) and how it came to be, as a component of the investigation of the incident aboard the USS SARATOGA (CV-60) in the Med.

Today, some beginning information on the Personnel Qualification System (PQS) and, as I continue, how it played into this incident.

One of my assigned team members, LCDR Don Diehl, wasn’t a big proponent of PQS. While he wore the “water wings” of a Surface Warfare Officer, he has spent much of his career aboard aircraft carriers, being assigned to the USS EISENHOWER (CV-69) in the Operations Department at the time of this assignment. At first, we locked horns many evenings, as we traveled the East Coast and all the way to the Red Sea over the need for this program. He eventually saw my point, as we cut through the standard standard objections fleet sailors like to put forward.

I intend to take the issue of how PQS works up in detail one day soon, as I ended up getting elbow deep in the program in the last half of my career, but the basics of PQS is to validate that training has been held and the knowledge from training retained by the person who will be “qualified” to stand watches of preform various duties aboard ships. In the aviation world, the analogous program is NATOPS. On submarines, they use some PQS, but then have another program in place to validate crew members can perform their duties.

Aboard the USS SARATOGA, the key players in the scenario were:

• Tactical Action Officer (TAO) (Navy Aviator LT (O-3)), Not qualified by PQS
• Ship’s Weapons Coordinator (SWC) (Navy Aviator LT (O-3)), Not qualified by PQS
• Target Acquisition System (TAS) Operator (FC2 (E-5)), Qualified by PQS
• Firing Officer Console (FOC) Operator (FC3 (E-4)), Not qualified by PQS

The TAO did have a letter of designation from the Commanding Officer, an essential piece of paper to allow someone other than the Commanding Officer of a vessel to employ the Ship’s weapons. This position came about during the Vietnam era, when the age of anti-ship cruise missiles rose into a real possibility, reducing reaction times dramatically from the days of gun fights at sea, where you generally had some notice before the first was joined. It is an job of great significance, as it requires a great degree of discretion and sound judgment under conditions requiring split second decision making skills with accuracy.

The path to qualification for the TAO required attending a shore based course (it was six weeks long during my career), where you are first given the “threat matrix,” massive lists of the weapon systems that we were likely to face and their technical capabilities. These were to be memorized, as the information must be readily available when sensors alert you to the inbound weapon, or presence of a threat platform.

Upon return from the school, and usually after some period of “under instruction (UI)” watchstanding, the Commanding Officer would convene a qualification board of the crew experts and you would be grilled on the ship’s specific processes, procedures, current operations orders, rule of engagement (ROE) and your knowledge of the friendly and enemy threat capabilities. If you passed muster, then you were given a letter of qualification, to be filed in your record and annotated on your fitness reports, and allowed to bear the responsibility of the authority to say “SHOOT!” and have people do what you say in a life and death situation.

Were is PQS in this? There was one, the 43304 series. Back then, it was either the B or C edition, but it is now up to the D edition. If it existed, then its use was required. Who says? Well, the Chief of Naval Operations, for one. From OPNAVINST 3500.34F, para. 4.F.:

4.F. PQS use is mandatory, except when suspended or canceled by the lead respective Type Commander (TYCOM). […]

It had that same paragraph for my time in service, therefore, unless Commander, Naval Air Forces Atlantic (COMNAVAIRLANT) had issued a directive to not use the PQS for TAO, it also had to be a part of the path to qualification for the TAO’s aboard SARATOGA. I say SARATOGA, but off all the PQS’ in use, I regularly had arguments with Commanding Officers on surface ships, saying the TAO qualification was up to them, and they didn’t think they needed to use PQS to qualify TAOs. I always figured 4 stars beat any oak leaf or eagle, but that might have just been a pet peeve with me….

There is/was PQS for the Mk-23 TAS Opertator, 43406 series, and also for the MK91 Fire Control/NATO Sea Sparrow Missile System Operators (43328 series). I didn’t regularly work aboard aircraft carriers, and I can’t find a listing for PQS for the Ship’s Weapons Coordinator for a CV Combat Direction Center (CDC), but I suspect it existed.

More later on the PQS issues and the incident….

A shipmate from USS FIRST SHIP was one of the many veterans standing tall on Saturday, 3/17/2007 in Washington, DC.

He sent this memento. The picture was taken early Saturday morning at the Lincoln Memorial:

(click on the picture for the larger, original photo)Lifted from “SITREP 01:”

The traitors couldn’t have numbered greater than a thousand or so while the vets surely had mustered three or four times that. In addition to the usual suspects, Cindy Sheehan, Jane Fonda, Cynthia McKinney, Maxine Waters, etc, there was a decidedly younger crowd, appearing in dress and demeanor as I recall the “flower-children” of the late 60’s. A few “brave” traitors ventured among us with their messages of peace and were met generally with disdain as indicated by the below clip from WJLA TVs (Wash DC) website.

and…from “SITREP 02:”

The “Eagles” arrived at 0600 and began milling about smartly. I snapped this photo with my cell phone as they unfurled one of the banners prior to any “traitor” arrivals. This was on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Fox news was the only network that accurately depicted our force strength at 3 to 4 times that of the moonbats.

Another bit of history from a Vet…

Tracked back @: Stop the ACLU, Stuck on Stupid, Big Dog’s Weblog, Is It Just Me?, stikNstein, Right Wing Nation, Third World County

Busy, busy, busy….

“Open trackbacks here! Get yer Open Trackbacks!” (That’s an invitation and a hint. After all, it is Wednesday.)

From the past writings: “How are we going to get that one?”, a short tale of the sea, 86 degree water, a volunteer, a “fat ship” and “unmanned aerial vehicles.”

Received via email:

The U.S. Navy Memorial has invited me to talk about <a href=”http://www.amazon.com/No-Higher-Honor-Roberts-Persian/dp/1591146615/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-7710835-5954261?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174321459&sr=8-1″>”No Higher Honor:
Saving the USS Samuel B. Roberts in the Persian Gulf”</a> (Naval Institute Press, 2006) at noon on Wednesday, March 21. The talk is open to the public, and I warmly invite you to come. The memorial is located at 701 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington, DC 20004 (Map and
directions; web site: http://www.lonesailor.org).

“No Higher Honor” tells the story of the USS Samuel B. Roberts, a small warship dispatched to the Persian Gulf in 1988. Its crew shepherded oil tankers through the chaos of the Iran-Iraq War — until disaster struck. On 14 April, an Iranian mine ripped open the Roberts’ engineroom, ignited fires on four decks, and plunged the ship into darkness. With seawater rising around their boots, the crew fought fire and flooding into the night. Four days later, the U.S.
retaliated, sinking a half-dozen Iranian warships and boats in the biggest surface battle since World War II.

The book has received good reviews; the current issue of Military Officer magazine calls it “one of the most inspiring books about modern naval history.” Now in its second printing, the book has also inspired a History Channel documentary that is slated to air this fall.

Hope to see you on Wednesday.

Brad Peniston
————-
“No Higher Honor: Saving the USS Samuel B. Roberts in the Persian Gulf”
available in bookstores or via http://www.nohigherhonor.com.

My book report is here.

Sounds like a great lunch time activity to me…how about it, Steeljaw Scribe, Smash and Pinch?

Posted after action reports will be appreciated!

‘Jack Army’, the former Army recruiter and now member of the 25th Division and deployed to Iraq has begun an interesting project: He writes a story in chapters, and then each chapter goes to a different blogger to post, and then to be linked for your reading pleasure. The link here goes to my piece, which is Chapter 12. I have sent my link back to “Jack,” so he can pass it to the others on each side of my, and I hope to get similar data in soon, so I can connect the dots for the effort.

Great idea….share you story and share readership. I would suspect the posts will get much more visibility as a result….